Arafat Takes His Hat Off to Mrs. Rabin
Derek Brown in Jerusalem reports on a furtive meeting which brought the PLO leader to Tel Aviv to pay his respects

Derek Brown
11 November 1995

The Guardian (London)

THERE were hundreds of well-wishers outside Leah Rabin's Tel Aviv flat. Not one of them recognised the stocky figure, in black coat and cap, who hurried through a side entrance to console the Middle East's most high-profile widow.

Yasser Arafat had come to call. The man who has been demonised as the arch enemy of Israel for three decades was at last paying his respects to a slain Israeli leader.

The visit on Thursday night was not exactly private, but it was, of necessity, furtive. The chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organisation set foot in Israel proper for the first time, after a brief helicopter flight from his headquarters in the Gaza Strip.

He landed at Dov airport, outside Tel Aviv, and was whisked by car to the Rabin flat in the north of the city. With him were two of his top lieutenants in the self-rule Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas (nom de guerre Abu Mazen) and Ahmad Qurei (Abu Ala).

Three years ago the trio would most likely have been shot on sight had they been daft enough to turn up in Tel Aviv. But on Thursday night their trip was arranged by a former senior officer of the Shin Bet secret police, Yossi Ginnossar. They came in peace and were greeted as friends.

Even so, in Israel, especially now, security is everything. Before the PLO were let into the flat, Mrs Rabin's other visitors were asked to leave. She greeted her guests with only her immediate family, their close friend Eitan Haber, and army chief of staff Amnon Shahak.

"My husband regarded you as his partner in peace," Mrs Rabin told Mr Arafat, according to Israel Radio.

Mr Arafat, asked later what he had said to Mrs Rabin, replied: "That we lost a great man who made the peace of the brave with us. He was our partner and we thank you for continuing his road and his march."

According to the Israeli news agency Itim the mood was very emotional. There was one extraordinary hint of intimacy. The picture in yesterday's Ma'ariv daily showed Mr Arafat sitting opposite Mrs Rabin, without his red-and-white chequered keffiah.

The headdress, Mr Arafat's most famous trademark, is his defence of his advanced baldness of which he is said to be extremely sensitive. To have bared his head in respect for his hostess was a touchingly self-deprecating gesture.

Mr Arafat had been on the sidelines of grief all week. The Israelis asked him not to attend Monday's funeral of his murdered fellow Nobel peace laureate. They feared the security and political repercussions of having a man who had been reviled for so long, suddenly turning up at the heart of the country's affairs.

Mr Arafat had to speak his tributes in isolation in Gaza. He was pictured in his office, glumly watching the live television coverage. Many Israelis thought he should have been at the graveside, but said he had behaved with more dignity than many of their own rightwing politicians, who were shrilly absolving themselves of responsibility for the hatred which killed Yitzhak Rabin.

Thursday night's furtive visit was not altogether dignified, but it probably enhanced Mr Arafat's reputation as a man prepared to do the decent thing.

It has also thrust Mrs Rabin further towards the centre stage of Israeli public life. She has already captured the public imagination, for sharing her grief and speaking her mind. On Monday, the country watched her weeping in the arms of her family in Mount Herzl national cemetery. Later it was transfixed by her quiet but forceful condemnation of the rightwingers who had hurled abuse at her husband.

She candidly confirmed that she had snubbed Binyamin Netanyahu, the opposition leader, at the funeral and blamed him for encouraging the right's abusive campaign against the peace accords.

It is widely believed in Israel that Mrs Rabin is keen to take up her late husband's political standard and stand for his Labour Party in next year's parliamentary elections. The idea is said not to commend itself to Shimon Peres, the acting prime minister.

In the current climate of grief and remorse, her apparent determination to enter public affairs could be hard to refuse.

Tomorrow, the Rabin family will return to Mount Herzl for a solemn ceremony marking the end of the traditional seven-day period of mourning. In the evening Mrs Rabin will be the key speaker at a peace rally in Tel Aviv where, last Saturday evening, her husband was gunned down.